The Man in Possession — page 112: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE MAN IN POSSESSION. 107 Aunt Judy at once professed herself ready to ac- - company Kate to the select circle who were doing their best to make ‘‘a discord of sweet sounds” for Sir Wilfred’s edification, so the trio walked slowly across the long drawing-room, watched by many critical, and not a few envious eyes. ‘‘That girl is determined to hunt down one or other of the ‘eligibles,’” said Lady Carnegie to her friend and toady, Miss Medway. ‘‘As soon as Sir Wilfred shook her off, she seized upon young Rivers. It’s quite disgraceful to see girls going on like that.” ‘‘She has no mother, I believe,” said Miss Med- way, whose tastes were ‘‘horsey,” and whose claims to feminine beauty rested merely on an eminently Roman nose, and a complexion of brick-dust hue which was so natural that no one ever envied or criticised it. ‘*No; that dreadful noisy Irishman is her father. I can’t understand why Lady Jocelyn asks such people here. And the idea of letting Sir Wilfred take that girl in to dinner!” Kate had already earned the distinction—whether enviable or not—of being called ‘‘that girl.” It is, I believe, a sort of brevet rank given by feminine spite to any one of whom it disapproves. It means all—or nothing ; it disdains definition, and is only _ barbed by bitterness. It cannot be held responsi- ble in the court of slander for anything it has con- veyed or suggested, because it avoids any adjective of an uncomplimentary nature; but it is strangely efficacious in branding its subject as a black sheep COMicloe (Sri C(O)